He Finds Spirit In The Earth

ART - REVIEW

Potter John Tilton Breathes Life And Personality Into His Ceramics

John Tilton's life is the kind that doesn't happen much anymore: an artisan who makes it without making it big, an artisan who pursues his craft without much attention to what's cool or what rules.

He doesn't have a Web page. But he does have a potter's studio in the woods near Alachua, and he has a show of recent pottery at Crealde School of Art's Winter Park gallery.

Tilton's exhibition, titled ``Earthy and Ethereal'' and curated by Crealde's Susan Vey, includes about 35 ceramic works of quiet skill and subtle distinction.

The most imposing of these works are the stoneware platters. The largest is nearly 3 feet across, double-rimmed like a big yellow eye, peering at us with a spiral pupil.

The other works are mostly jars or vases or bowls, many traditional shapes except for the ``wiggle'' jars - pots that swell three times and are topped by a little pig-tail handle. Even the simplest of these jars are things of perfection, their shape turned without wobble, their red or cobalt glaze flawless as a mirror.

The variety of texture and colors comes from Tilton's mastery of the kiln. It's in the firing, says Tilton in his statement, that ``earth and spirit'' are fused. ``There are times during the pots' successive, intense firings when something mysterious occurs,'' something that transforms mere clay ``into an embodiment of spirit.''

One especially mysterious soda jar seems to have been touched with an orangeish yellow blaze on one side. A blue soda bud vase, on the other, has the meditative feel of a Chinese landscape, with blue river and green landscape giving way to a reddening sky.

Tilton's crystalline pots, often thrown in unassuming shapes, must be approached like an abstract painting in miniature. One crystalline bowl modulates quietly from pink to magenta, then seems to dissolve into nothingness - or ``pure spirit.''

Not everything is sweetness and light. Tilton knows how to work the anagama kiln, where pots are essentially buried in earth, with a wood fire at one end and a hole for a chimney at the other. This process yields a crustier glaze, full of brutish colors and complexities - greens, browns, and dirty orange.

There's no doubt that these wood-fired pieces are the ``earthy'' counterparts to the ``ethereal'' character of the crystalline glazes. The patience of this process, the willingness to take a chance with the fire, is what Tilton has perfected over a 30-year career. He won best-of-show at Winter Park Art Festival in 1972, when it was more art and less festival than it is today.

At the time, said Tilton from his north Florida studio, he had only been making ceramics for three years. By his own admission, he was ``in over his head,'' and spent several years ``in the dark,'' just learning the craft.

With experience, there is not just greater skill but a greater appreciation. ``When you've done it for 30 years, the subtlety is revealed,'' he explains.

There's nothing flashy here. Even the installation is rather humble. But this is no flash in the pan, either. That artists will devote such care to a slow craft is itself something of a wonder in today's world of easy riches and instant communications.

``To me, it is important that each piece transcend its physical presence,'' says Tilton's statement, ``that it be not just a pot, but a pot which contains something which cannot be seen at first glance (a secret, if you will).'' And Tilton is most willing to let you in on his secret.